May 4, 2025 | #38 | read on The Happier Studio | Free Version
Welcome to The Happier Newsletter, a weekly newsletter where I provide actionable ideas to help you build a happier, healthier, and more meaningful life.
What’s On Today
- You’re Living in a False Narrative
- The Time Audit Exercise
You’re Living in a False Narrative
We like to think we know how we spend our time. But the truth is, most of us are living in a false narrative.
We say we’re too busy to focus on what matters: to move our body, to start that idea, to reach out to someone we love. But somehow, we always have time to scroll, swipe, and sink into distraction.
The problem isn’t time. It’s a lack of awareness.
Most of your daily choices aren’t conscious. They’re automatic. In neuroscience, this is known as default mode processing. Your brain running habitual loops to conserve energy. Helpful for tying your shoes. Terrible for building an intentional life.
Here’s the wake-up call: A Harvard study found that the average person spends 47% of their waking hours thinking about something other than what they’re doing.
No wonder time feels like it’s slipping away.
So how do you break the cycle?
By spotting your time thieves and your time multipliers:
🕳 Time thieves drain your energy and give little in return. They’re the tasks that leave you wondering, “How did that take up so much of my day?”
⚡ Time multipliers are rare and valuable. They give back more than they take, creating energy, focus, or momentum that spills into everything else.
But you can’t fix what you don’t track.
That’s why I recommend doing a Time Audit, a simple but powerful tool that changed everything for me.
The Time Audit Exercise
Most people misjudge how they spend their time by more than 30%. And in a world engineered to hijack your attention, that misjudgment becomes a hidden tax on your life.
Here’s the math:
Losing just 2 hours a day to distraction = 730 hours a year.
That’s enough time to:
- Learn a skill that changes your career
- Launch a side project
- Rebuild your health or relationships
- Finally do the thing you keep putting off
The problem is, it never feels like a loss, until you see the pattern.
That’s the power of a time audit.
It’s not about guilt. It’s about visibility.
It shows you what your week actually looks like, so you can start designing one that works.
Step 1: Rebuild the Truth
Start with your calendar. Apple Calendar, Google Calendar, paper journal - doesn’t matter.
Reconstruct your last 7 days in 1–2 hour blocks.
Write down exactly what you were doing in each window.
Don’t write “work.” Write: responding to emails, scrolling Twitter while pretending to work, watching Netflix, making dinner, playing with my kid etc.
Include both your work and personal life.
If you can’t remember perfectly, estimate. You’re not tracking to judge yourself, you’re tracking to wake up.
Step 2: Label the Layers
Time is one thing. Energy and focus are everything.
For each block, rate:
Energy:
🟢 Green = Energised
🟠 Orange = Neutral
🔴 Red = Drained
Focus:
+ (Plus) = You were present. You knew why you were doing what you were doing.
– (Minus) = You were distracted or mentally scattered.
What you’re looking for is alignment:
- When did your best energy go to your most important work?
- Where did energy and attention fall out of sync?
You may be surprised at how often your high-energy hours are wasted on low-impact tasks.
Step 3: Reflect Without Judgment
Now zoom out and ask yourself:
- When did I feel most energised and what was I doing?
- When was I most focused and why?
- How much of my time reflected what actually matters to me?
- What distracted me and how often?
Look for patterns. Spot the leaks. Name the multipliers and the thieves.
This part is all about understanding where your time is actually going, and reclaiming control.
Step 4: Recalibrate Intentionally
Now ask: What’s one thing I’ll do differently this week?
Don’t overhaul your entire life. That’s a recipe for failure.
Make one small shift:
- Move your deep work to your peak energy window
- Reclaim one hour from distraction and invest it into growth
- Add something that energises you (a walk, journaling, reading)
Repeat it. Refine it. Let it compound.
Big change begins with one clear step.
I highly recommend doing this exercise. It genuinely changed my life when I felt constantly time-poor and overwhelmed.
I used to end my days unfulfilled, like I was using all my time to do things that didn’t align with my values. Things that looked productive on the surface but left me feeling empty.
The Time Audit changed that.
Even though I still have the same 24 hours in a day, I now spend more of them on what truly matters, because I became aware of the time thieves, and I’ve drastically reduced them.
As a result, I feel more energised, more focused, and happier.
Not because I’m doing more, but because I’m finally doing the right things.
So if you’ve been feeling scattered, behind, or stuck in the wrong loop…
Do the audit.
Awareness really is the first step to freedom.
